When I started my consulting business in 2002, one of the biggest challenges was how to face one of my worst fears.

Not running out of money (though that happened), not having to go back and get a job (though that almost happened) but how to work with the High Dominant leaders and business owners I would inevitably have as clients.

You see, as a naturally low Dominant at the time (I’m MUCH higher on the D-scale now!), High D’s were scary and intimidating. I didn’t care that their “bark was worse than their bite” – it was their bark that scared me in the first place!

So for quite a few years, I kept my mouth shut and toed the line like a good little soldier. Until I realized, they already had plenty of soldiers around them. They were paying me to tell them the truth.

I will never forget the day when I had to decide whether or not to confront a CEO in front of his team for some pretty bad behavior during a team training.

My choice to do so had me, literally, shaking. While he didn’t say anything to me at the time (or the rest of the day for that matter), I began to dread the next morning when he would be driving me back to the airport.

This was what he said when I got in the car, “You know Nancy, I wasn’t very happy when you told me yesterday that I intimidated my team and that my response frightened even you. But then I started to think about it. My teenage daughters have been telling me for years that I scare them and I’ve never believed it. I thought it was some sort of manipulation tactic. So I went home last night and for the first time apologized to them.”

And that has been indicative of my experience working with High Dominant leaders over the past 15 years.

They aren’t always aware of their behavior and they are rarely aware of its full impact on others.

But when they truly get it, it can be one of the most enlightening
moments that shifts every relationship they have.